


Darkness My Old Friend

by alexus



Category: Buffy the Vampire Slayer (TV)
Genre: Angst, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-23
Updated: 2018-04-23
Packaged: 2019-04-26 19:22:55
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,088
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14408880
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/alexus/pseuds/alexus
Summary: Meet Alexander Lavelle Harris, the Heart of the Scooby Gang, the guy that didn't fit in...





	Darkness My Old Friend

**Author's Note:**

> All characters belong to Joss Almighty!

_Hello darkness, my old friend_  
_I've come to talk with you again_  
_Because a vision softly creeping_  
_Left its seeds while I was sleeping_  
_And the vision that was planted in my brain_  
_Still remains_  
_Within the sound of silence…_

In a way, Alexander Lavelle Harris was born under a bad sign.

From the very beginning his relatively short life could be summarized in one sentence: Xander Harris just didn’t fit in. He didn’t belong anywhere. To the outside world he has always been some kind of zeppo: simple-minded geek, annoying outcast, big loser. No exceptional talents, no special abilities, no superpowers. No nothing.

His parents never loved him. For people as drunk and bitter as Tony and Jessica Harris their only child was nothing, but a mistake, the constant reminder about their troubled youth, the major disappointment. Had they had an access to more advanced birth control back in a day, Xander wouldn’t been brought into this world – that’s for sure. For Harris couple their son has always been someone, who would never amount to anything, never achieve anything in this life.

The school was a disaster. Most students viewed him as a plain weirdo – the one, who could be easily ridiculed or bullied. Outsider at the very bottom of their own so-called social ladder. He had a terrible haircut, wore extremely unfashionable clothes, listened to the ‘outdated’ country music, cracked lame jokes, was friends with nerdy Jesse McNally (who had later disappeared under mysterious circumstances), wallflower-y Willow Rosenberg and obviously unstable Buffy Summers. That was more than enough to consider the guy a loser and give him constant grief! Xander knew his fellow students’ attempts to humiliate and belittle him at all cost only served as a means to make their own existence less miserable. Though sometimes it could get very hard and lead to some breaking point…

Teachers? Teachers weren’t much better. Xander would be really surprised if any of them bothered to remember his name or face at all. Those who did remember him, could bet that Harris The Troublemaker would find himself either in the gutter with no job and college degree, or the jail cell for some petite crime.

Nevertheless, after joining Buffy and the gang Alexander Harris without hesitation stalked Sunnydale’s night streets along with his friends, ready to fight every creature of darkness in order to protect the lives of those same people, who treated him like shit.

Since the blonde Slayer had walked into his life, Xander was relieved to find some sort of purpose, or life goal. In his case being a Slayerette brought the feeling of belonging, and belonging brought some feeling of the partial security (as odd as it sounds considering Scoobies’ night life). For the first time the brown-eyed boy was something more than just a useless loser most people believed him to be. After joining the Scooby Gang Xander fought countless battles, helped saving the world on almost daily basis, stared death in the face on more than one occasion, lost friends and loved ones, lost his left eye… But the others took him for granted…

_Where are the heroes that sang them old songs?_  
_You recognize a hero 'cause he don't belong…_

As years went by Xander started to feel alienated and left behind. While Willow and Buffy grew more powerful and enlightened day-by-day, Xander remained the way he’s always been: ordinary man with no special abilities, the joker, the guy who fixed windows, the guy who was no match for them in almost every field bar carpentry. Xander saw them being over him, and he could do nothing about it. No matter what he did, or how hard he tried, he couldn’t avoid drifting apart with his best friends. Xander had shown many times, that he was capable of extraordinary things and his loyalty knew no boundaries when it came to his friends and the Cause. But unfortunately it never seemed enough… Was it because of just ‘usual’ Harris luck or some family curse, he didn’t know.

He meant every word he said, when he spoke to Dawn in the last year of Sunnydale: “They'll never know how tough it is, Dawnie, to be the one who isn't chosen. To live so near to the spotlight and never step in it. But I know. I see more than anybody realizes because nobody's watching me”.

Xander Harris spent the bigger part of his life among the slayers and seers, vampires and mystical keys, demons and werewolves, witches and watchers. Who was he compared to them? They had it ALL. What else could he give his powerful friends except his heart, unconditional love and willingness to die for them?

On Kingman’s Bluff he laid his life at his best friend’s feet, ready to sacrifice himself just to ease Willow’s pain, loneliness and despair. But did something like that really matter anymore? Did it ever matter?..

Willow meant the world to him, still means actually. Xander’s best friend in the whole white world, his almost sister, his soulmate. He knew he could never make her happy and that she deserved someone way better than carpenter with lame jokes and the habit of screwing things up, but he continued to love and care for her. Though he truly loved Buffy and Dawn, Cordelia and Anya, and to some extent Giles, Faith and even Angel or Spike, the small redhead has always had a very special place in his heart.

Unfortunately time started rearing its ugly head, and the two of them began slowly drifting apart, losing touch. First Oz and Cordelia, and then Anya, Tara and Kennedy took the places in the Love Department – those places that used to belong exclusively to Willow and Xander. And in Willow’s case very soon Buffy and Giles took over the Best Friends Department as well. Sure, the Uber-Wicca continued to love and care for her childhood friend in one way or another, but all of this was mere a far cry from true love and comfort they used to share back in the days of innocence, when both of them were kids, and all they had in the whole world was each other… These days Willow preferred to follow Buffy’s lead and give her body and soul to Kennedy…

…Sometimes it seemed like Xander Harris was destined to be alone and constantly rejected. His parents didn’t love and had no faith in him, his fellow high school students despised him, his teachers disliked him. His friends had less and less need in him. It looked like some kinda pattern of his life: to be underrated, left behind and misunderstood.

And sometimes it all seemed like a curse, stupid freakin’ curse. Cordelia’s particular wish back in high school probably had far-reaching consequences for Alexander Lavelle Harris… His countless flaws and fuck-ups, failings to meet his parents’ and friends’ expectations, falling-outs with Buffy and Willow, spells that went wrong, weaknesses and insecurities, screwed-up wedding, inability to save his fiancée’s life during the battle with the First etc. only added insult to injury.

As a result Xander’s world became darker with every passing year. Gone were the joy and the laughter, the jokes and the hope for the best. He felt like darkness slowly surrounded him. The joys of the past turned into distant memory, his present walked hand in hand with pain and despair, his future was shrouded in darkness and uncertainty. Darkness that appeared to be his true friend. His only friend…

Xander’s heart – the Heart of the Scooby Gang in fact – became colder, filled with sorrow and loss. The painful awareness that the ones he loved didn’t need him anymore, paved way for bitterness, anger and resentment towards those he once considered friends. Those who, he believed, would stay with him forever. Who on the contrary had almost rejected him, despite all his sacrifices, despite him proving his love and loyalty constant times.

Everything’s changed. Times changed, circumstances changed, people changed. Childhood was gone, innocence was gone. Hope slowly faded away. Willow, Buffy, Dawn, Faith, Giles – all of them had descended into their own complicated lives, lived in their own world, a world in which Xander Harris had less and less place. Those who meant everything to him, who once were the part of him, evolved over the years into some elite race of their own – the Chosen Ones, the Powerful Ones, the Super Humans. Non-chosen one-eyed carpenters need not apply…

_In restless dreams I walked alone_  
_Narrow streets of cobblestone_  
_'Neath the halo of a street lamp_  
_I turned my collar to the cold and damp_  
_When my eyes were stabbed by the flash of a neon light_  
_That split the night_  
_And touched the sound of silence_

_And in the naked light I saw_  
_Ten thousand people, maybe more_  
_People talking without speaking_  
_People hearing without listening_  
_People writing songs that voices never share_  
_And no one dared_  
_Disturb the sound of silence_

…Xander Harris was no fool, despite what many people – including some of his friends – thought about him. He knew quite well that all of this won’t last forever. The only comfort he had was a glimmer of hope, that everything he did since the Day One, every battle he fought, every friend or stranger he saved, every Apocalypse he averted, wasn’t for nothing. Deep in his aching heart he felt that there would come a day, when his contribution to the Cause would be finally acknowledged.

In the future to come someone would write the true history of the Slayers, the Scooby Gang and their Holy War, and Xander Harris might find his place in its annals. There will come a day the history proves him right. Even Willow and Buffy will figure it out one day…

His whole life looked like running on the razor’s edge. Or maybe staring into an abyss, which inevitably kept staring back at him in return. The young man knew for a fact that there’ll be no happy ending – at least in a way most people saw the thing. His types usually didn’t have happy endings. Hellmouth – wherever it was – was no place for freakin’ happy-endings.

Death appeared to be the only option. Probably the only solution. Many have already paid with their lives, and there were many more to follow. Would his own death be quick and easy, or long and painful – this Xander couldn’t say. Yet he had no doubt that he would leave this world still being young. In the early days the very thought of death could send shivers down his spine, but that’s also changed. Xander was afraid no more. He accepted his fate, embraced death, patiently waited for it. Even at this moment he’s aware, that one day her skinny hand will knock on his door.

But until then he will somehow make it through the night. He’ll stick to his guns – even if it’s the last time in his sad life – and carry on. He’ll keep fighting a good fight, with no one at his side, ‘til the very end. He’ll stay true to himself, his roots, his words and his consciousness no matter what. They can drive him out of the Scooby Gang, but they can’t take the spirit of the ‘Scooby’ from him!

Until his last dying breath Alexander Harris will battle the forces of Evil having solitude and sadness as his only companions. He will do it for ALL of them. Especially for those who are no longer with him. For Jesse, Jenny and Tara. For Molly, Chloe, Amanda and his beloved Anya. For Spike (hell yeah, even for Spike!) and countless others, chosen or non-chosen…

He may have been born under a bad sign, and screwing-up may be a part of his DNA, he may be worse than the rest of them and accomplish much less, but he had been there, he fought by their side and he’ll never give up that fight!

*****

  
…Xander lays alone in his room in complete silence. His weary eye stares at the rays of sunlight shining through the window, announcing the dawn of a new day. Sure, the darkness of the night continues to be fallen hero’s only friend, but it’s the morning sun that brings him some hope and relief...

_Here I go again on my own_  
_Goin' down the only road I've ever known_  
_Like a drifter I was born to walk alone_  
_'Cause I know what it means to walk along the lonely street of dreams…_

**The End.**


End file.
